Employment tribunal rules that performing the chicken dance isn't grounds for dismissal

A operator for Sydney Ferries in Australia was ordered to rehire an "alpha male" employee who was fired for allegedly performing the chicken dance in a mocking move to his colleague.

The workplace tribunal ordered Sydney Ferries operator Harbor City Ferries to reinstate Timothy Redden, 51, after finding that performing the chicken dance was not a valid reason for dismissal. Harbor City Ferries terminated Mr Redden's employment when it discovered he called his colleague a "dog" and, when his colleague ignored him, performed the chicken dance at him to imply he was a chicken for not retaliating. One of the two dances was captured on a CCTV.
Fair Work Commissioner Ian Cambridge found the employee, who he described as an "alpha male", was unfairly dismissed and should have been given a final warning instead. "In particular, one major aspect of the reasons for dismissal which involved a finding that the applicant performed the "chicken dance" as an intentional act to intimidate, harass or otherwise harm another employee, was simply fanciful and did not represent valid reason for dismissal," he said.
The commissioner also said the workplace investigation was flawed in that the employer readily accepted the words of others and rejected Mr Redden's, perhaps due to the sacked employee's "somewhat disagreeable demeanor". "Even unpleasant people are entitled to justice," he said.

Plan to close school with no pupils

Plans to close a school with no pupils have been consulted on. Ravenstonedale Endowed School in Cumbria has had no children since September. A head teacher and five part-time staff are still employed. The proposals will be voted on in March and, if approved, the school will close in April.
Pupil numbers have dropped from 65 in 2000 to 26 in September last year, falling to zero by the beginning of the current academic year.
Cumbria County Council said there was "little prospect" of the school recovering in the "foreseeable future". The nearest alternative school is just under five miles (8km) away in Kirkby Stephen.

The Best Corn Maze Ever Has Lost People Calling 911

What should have been an a-maze-ing fall activity had some California residents calling police. The largest corn maze in the world - in Dixon, California, USA - is no laughing matter to Dixon county deputies who had to respond to constant emergency calls from people stuck in the labyrinth.
Matt Cooley, the owner of the maze, suggests that next year people should grab a map before heading in.

Police in toasted sandwich mercy dash to elderly lady

Police in New Zealand rushed to the rescue of an elderly woman who had not eaten in three days. The 90-year-old from Wanganui was trying to get a toasted sandwich delivered to her home last week and, in desperation, called the police. Her call went out over the police radio and was picked up by an enthusiastic patrol, who ordered a toastie from a fish-and-chip shop and delivered it.

Sergeant Colin Wright said the call came in about 9.30pm after the woman, who lived alone and had been unwell, became "distressed and desperate" when she could not order a toastie to be delivered. "She hadn't eaten, the previous three days," Mr Wright said. "I don't know how many places or who she'd phoned.
"She had obviously tried a couple of fish and chip shops and probably there was nobody else to call." He said police "absolutely" enjoyed doing those types of jobs when a person needed their help. "We're forever going to victims of burglaries, assaults and car crashes. This is someone who's vulnerable who we can help.
"One of our roles is to look after vulnerable people, be that mentally, physically or age-wise. That's why officers jumped to it. We could even have gone back to the police station and cooked one up ourselves." Mr Wright felt the tale epitomized what police stood for "in terms of serving the community". He called the hospital and they were arranging for social services to help the woman. "It's an opportunity for people to see we're human, believe it or not."

Would-be shoplifter fled store wearing only his boxer shorts after fight with owners

A 21-year-old man who allegedly tried to steal two bottles of beer from a convenience store in Beaverton, Oregon, ended up wearing just his boxer shorts after the store owners wrestled with him.

The co-owners of Best Mart grabbed hold of Solomon Yemane-Berhane soon after one prevented him from walking out the front door late on Nov. 9. The three tussled for about three minutes as the store owners attempted to detain him, while at least two customers stood and watched.
Yemane-Berhane eventually managed to slip out of the grip of the husband and wife owners, after losing his jacket, hat, shirt and shorts in the process, and sprinted out of the door. He came back moments later to pick up his jacket and again left. The owners had followed Yemane-Berhane out the door after he managed to elude them. The two other people in the store left soon after, as well.

YouTube link.

Broken beer bottles, overturned displays and merchandise were strewn throughout the store after the scuffle. Police arrested Yemane-Berhane nearby. Yemane-Berhane was indicted last Friday by a Washington County grand jury on charges of resisting arrest, assaulting a police officer, third-degree robbery, third-degree criminal mischief, third-degree theft and fourth-degree assault.

Becareful what you wish for ...

A Florida town passed an anti-homeless law that prohibited lying in parks.

A homeless man called the police on a family having a picnic.

The family was escorted away

... You just might get it.

Tourists in Venice risk €500 fine for loud luggage

Tourists to Venice in Italy, could face a €500 (£400, $630) fine if they wheel noisy suitcases around the watery city, under new proposals outlined on Thursday.

Venetians are tired of being kept awake at night by throngs of tourists, wheeling their luggage through the city’s narrow streets and over its famous bridges.
Now the city’s special commissioner, Vittorio Zappalorto, has come up with a plan to let his citizens get their 40 winks, by banning the suitcases. Under new anti-noise pollution proposals, tourists will be barred from bringing luggage with plastic or full rubber wheels to Venice.
But bicycle-style tires, made from rubber and filled with air, will be allowed. If Zapalorto’s plan gets the go ahead, tourists will be fined between €100 and €500 if they break the suitcase rule. Venetians, however, will be free to continue to use whichever luggage they please.

6 rue du Lac (Brussels/ Belgium)

This beautiful Art Nouveau building on 6 rue du Lac in Brussels was designed by Ernest Delune in 1902. It was the studio and home of Austrian master glass maker Clas Grüner Sterner, who also made the stained glass doors & windows.

Colorful South American Buses

Here is a smorgasbord of various interesting buses and truck-conversions from different countries in South America, most of them using standard production models from the 1960s and 1970s - just wildly embellished and decorated. If you are braving some of the riskiest roads, you might as well have a colorful ride!

This 2000-Year-Old Pigment Can Eliminate The Third Dimension

by Esther Inglis-Arkell

Han purple is an ancient pigment that wasn't reconstructed by modern chemists until 1992. After the chemists got done with it, it was the physicists' turn. Han purple, they found, eliminates an entire dimension. It makes waves go two-dimensional!

The Chemistry of Han Purple

You'll see Han purple on the famous terracotta warriors surrounding the tomb of the first emperor of China, or on ancient pottery and other works of art. Where you won't see it is on anything made between 220 A.D. and 1992, because after the pigment disappeared it took 1700 years to re-discover it. Elisabeth FitzHugh, a conservator at the Smithsonian, pinned down the chemical composition of the pigment and announced it was a barium copper silicate. (The paper describing the discovery is a fun read. It starts by pointing out the inferiority of other ancient purple pigments, which tended to be closer to red than purple. It also stresses that Tyrian purple, made from sea snails, was a textile dye, not a pigment, and that it could range anywhere from "reddish-blue to purplish-violet." Take that, Phoenicians!)

Exactly how some inventor stumbled on a way to make the pigment is still a matter of debate. An early theory, not believed by many, is that the Chinese learned how to make purple pigment from the Egyptians. Egyptian purple pigment seems to be similar, but the chemical formulas don't add up — Egyptians used calcium instead of barium. It's also not an easy process to pass from one culture to another. To get the elements to melt together, they have to be heated to about 850-1000 °C.

Most researchers think that because it contains both silicon and barium Han purple was a by-product of the glass-making process. Barium makes glass shinier and cloudy, which means this pigment could be the work of early alchemists trying to synthesize white jade.

Han Purple and the Third Dimension

Barium copper-silicate doesn't just have archaeologists and chemists intrigued. At normal temperatures, it's an insulator and is nonmagnetic. Along with its many fine properties - prettiness, historical importance, a hint of aristocratic style — barium copper-silicat has many electrons, some of which spin up and some of which are spin down.

Something unusual happens as the temperature drops and as a magnetic field is applied, although the temperature has to drop pretty far, going down to between one and three degrees Kelvin, and the magnetic field has to be about 800,000 times the strength of Earth's magnetic field. The results are worth it — the electrons seem to merge, taking on one spin, and acting as one electron.

That sounds like an ordinary superconductor, you say. Then you're as foolish as a Phoenician in sub-par purple! Han purple still has a trick up its sleeve. Drop the temperature some more and something happens to the magnetic wave traveling through the substance. At higher temperatures, it propagates like a regular wave, traveling in three dimensions. Get under one degree Kelvin, and it no longer has a vertical component. It propagates in two dimensions only.

Scientists think that this has something to do with the structure of barium copper silicate. It's components are arranged like layers of tiles, so they don't stack up neatly. Each layers' tiles are slightly out of sync with the layer below them. This may frustrate the wave and force it to go two dimensional.

Anyone wonder if ancient physicists discovered this? And if the secret to making Han purple was lost because they waved themselves into two dimensions?

Pink And Blue Quartz Geode

26 Pictures Will Make You Re-Evaluate Your Entire Existence

The universe, man... the universe is scary!

Ten Things You Might Not Know About Space

Astronomy provides a fascinating and even downright astonishing view of the universe.
Here are 10 oddities and misconceptions about space that you may - or may not - have heard before.

Mysterious Shrimp May Hold Keys To Alien Life

According to exobiologists at NASA, a mysterious shrimp and its symbiotic bacterium may hold clues about what life could be like on other planetary bodies. It's life that may be similar - at the basic level - to what could be lurking in the oceans of Europa, deep under

Police called to help escort pod of whales away from shoreline

Police officers from Essex were called in to help escort a pod of whales away from the shoreline to prevent them from being stranded on beaches or sandbanks. Officers from the marine unit and the helicopter were called in after the pod of forty 16ft long pilot whales was seen entering the River Blackwater on Tuesday. Members of the British Divers Marine Life Rescue charity called police and Coastguard when the whales were close to shallow water at St Lawrence Bay. The Special Branch Marine Unit used a high-speed RIB (rigid-hulled inflatable boat) to reach the scene and, with local boats, managed to turn the pod back towards the open sea. The mammals, which were believed to be following and eating shoals of herring, were later seen heading towards the shore between St Osyth and Jaywick.
Marine officers then called in a helicopter from the National Police Air Service. Also on board the aircraft was a technician from a mapping contractor who had previously served In the Royal New Zealand Air Force and had experience in marine surveillance and monitoring whales in Antarctica who was able to provide valuable information. PC Kevin Flinn, observer on the helicopter, said: "Our passenger was certainly an expert on using aircraft to shepherd the pod of whales. We hovered between the beach and the pod and were able to move closer to them until they turned and went back to deeper water. The whales were about five meters long and in very shallow water and with the tide receding.
"There certainly was a risk of them beaching on the sandbanks, but we moved them away from danger. The marine unit boat and other vessels then took over and escorted the pod further offshore.” At one point the helicopter descended to about 200ft to ‘flag down’ a fishing boat that was heading straight for the whales. The officers used their Sky Shout broadcasting system to alert the crew. The vessel stopped and the skipper was asked by the marine unit to steer clear of the whales. PC Simon Lofting from the Special Branch Marine Unit said: "We've had small numbers of dolphins and porpoises off Essex but this is the first time so many whales have been seen. We'd been out the previous day on the Thames when there were sightings off Southend and Kent, but we didn't find them.

YouTube link.

"But on Tuesday, following sightings in the River Blackwater, we were contacted by British Divers Marine Life Rescue and asked to assist. We had an expert from BDMLR on board our boat and he had real concerns that the whole pod could strand themselves. The helicopter did an amazing piece of work, not only moving the whales from shallow water but counting them accurately when the pod had split. We were told the previous day that there were 29 whales so the helicopter was a great resource in giving us accurate information. I would also like to thank the assistance of Inshore Fisheries and the river bailiff. Between the three vessels we managed to bring the whales together when the pod split and we moved to deeper water. It was certainly one of our more usual operations and we all worked closely to ensure that the whales were not stranded in shallow water while chasing shoals of herrings.”

Raccoon with head stuck in storm drain rescued

Members of Framingham Department of Public Works in Massachusetts recently rescued a raccoon with its head stuck in a storm drain.

Stormwater Supervisor Brooks McCarty said he and Animal Control Officer Kathy MacKenzie used soap to successfully get the critter unstuck from the cover.
"We soaped his head up and pulled and pulled and twisted," McCarty said.
"All of a sudden he just popped out and she let him go and he stood there confused and then just ran up into a tree."

Missing kitten found in duffel bag 2,300 miles from home

A New Mexico woman’s missing kitten has been located in Maine, although exactly how the feline made the 2,300-mile trip remains a mystery. The female kitten, named Spice, was turned in to the Animal Refuge League in Westbrook earlier this month by a man who found her inside a duffel bag outside a Portland thrift store.

“If only Spice could talk, imagine the story she would tell us,” said Jeana Roth, community relations manager of the Animal Refuge League of Greater Portland. “We called the microchip company and traced that microchip back to Albuquerque, New Mexico to a woman whose grey and white kitten went missing on Halloween night,” said Roth.
Jennifer Brown of the Animal Refuge League says she talked to the owner, who said Spice bolted on Halloween when she opened her door for trick-or-treaters. “The owner’s reaction was our reaction. She couldn’t believe it. She’s never been to Maine. She doesn’t know anybody who lives in Maine, so how her cat who got out of her home on Halloween night, made it to Portland, Maine, is a mystery to her as well as to us,” Roth said.

YouTube link.

“Perhaps somebody who was crossing the country picked Spice up as a travel companion,” Roth said. “She’s lovely. She seems like she’s had a great adventure if only she could tell us what happened,” Roth added. A Maine businessman has now agreed to pay for Spice’s commercial airline flight back to New Mexico.

Animal Pictures

The Daily Drift

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Today in History

1542   The English defeat the Scots at the Battle of Solway Moss in England.  
1859   Charles Darwin publishes The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life. The first printing of 1,250 copies sells out in a single day.  
1863   In the Battle Above the Clouds, Union Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker's forces take Lookout Mountain, near Chattanooga, Tennessee.  
1864   Kit Carson and his 1st Cavalry, New Mexico Volunteers, attack a camp of Kiowa Indians in the First Battle of Adobe Walls.  
1874   Joseph Glidden receives a patent for barbed wire.  
1902   The first Congress of Professional Photographers convenes in Paris.  
1912   Austria denounces Serbian gains in the Balkans; Russia and France back Serbia while Italy and Germany back Austria.  
1927   Federal officials battle 1,200 inmates after prisoners in Folsom Prison revolt.
1938   Mexico seizes oil land adjacent to Texas.  
1939   In Czechoslovakia, the Gestapo execute 120 students who are accused of anti-Nazi plotting.  
1944   American B-29s flying from Saipan bomb Tokyo.  
1949   The Iron and Steel Act nationalizes the steel industry in Britain.  
1950   UN troops begin an assault into the rest of North Korea, hoping to end the Korean War by Christmas.  
1961   The United Nations adopts bans on nuclear arms over American protests.  
1963   Jack Ruby fatally shoots the accused assassin of President Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald, in the garage of the Dallas Police Department.
1977   Greece announces the discovery of the tomb of King Philip II, father of Alexander the Great.  
1979   The United States admits that thousands of troops in Vietnam were exposed to the toxic Agent Orange.  
1992   US Congress passes the Brady Bill requiring a 5-day waiting period for handgun sales; the bill is named for Pres. Ronald Reagan's press secretary who was left partially paralyzed by a bullet during an assassination attempt on Reagan.  
1995   Ireland votes 50.28% to 49.72% to end its 70-year-old ban on divorce.  
2012   A fire at a clothing factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, kills over 110 people.